As of 2006, California had an estimated population of 37,172,015, more than 12 percent of the U.S. population. This includes a natural increase since the last census of 1,557,112 people (that is 2,781,539 births minus 1,224,427 deaths) and an increase due to net migration of 751,419 people. Immigration resulted in a net increase of 1,415,879 people, and migration from within the U.S. produced a net increase of 564,100 people. California is the 13th fastest-growing state. As of 2008, the total fertility rate was 2.15.[8]

California has the largest population of White Americans in the U.S., totaling 21,453,934 residents as of the 2010 census. The state has the fifth largest population of African Americans in the U.S., an estimated 2,299,072 residents. California's Asian population is estimated at 4.9 million, approximately one-third of the nation's estimated 15 million Asian Americans. California's Native American population of 362,801 is the most of any state; some estimates place the Native American population at one million.[citation needed]

As of 2011, California has the largest minority population in the United States. Non-Hispanic whites decreased from about 76.3 - 78% of the state's population in 1970[12] to 39.7% in 2011.[13] While the population of minorities accounts for 100.7 million of 300 million U.S. residents, 20% of the national total live in California.[14][15]

California has the highest number, and second highest percentage, of Asian Americans by state. Only Hawaii has a higher Asian American percentage than California. While New Mexico and Texas have higher percentages of Hispanics, California has the highest total number of Hispanics of any U.S. state.

Latinos, mainly Mexican Americans, form major portions of the population of Southern California, especially in Los Angeles, as well as the San Joaquin Valley. The city of Los Angeles is often said to be the largest Mexican community in the United States. Census records kept track of the growth since 1850, but Mexican and Mexican-Americans have lived in California since Spanish Colonial times. However, the number and percentage population of Latinos living in California increased rapidly in the late 20th century. The result is that, today, Latinos are the largest ethnic group in Los Angeles County, at over 40 percent of the county's population. Latinos are predominantly concentrated in the older eastern and southern suburbs surrounding downtown Los Angeles and northern Long Beach, the southern/eastern San Fernando Valley, and the San Gabriel/Pomona Valleys. They also comprise sizable communities in Bakersfield, Fresno, El Monte, La Puente, Riverside, Sacramento, San Bernardino, San Diego, San José, Santa Barbara, Santa Maria, Stockton and Vallejo. In Santa Ana in Orange County, Latinos comprise 75 percent of the population. Nearby Anaheim is over half Latino, and Orange County's population is 30-35 percent Latino.

In Mariposa County, there is a very small community of Californios or Spanish American people as they identify themselves, that dates back before the U.S. annexation of California. Hornitos is home to an estimated 1,000 people and many are "Californio". The community's "Spanish" Californio culture is closely linked with Mexico and other Latin American nations. Spanish colonial/Mexican/Latino influences was always a minor part of California after it became part of the U.S. since 1848 and its statehood in 1850.[citation needed]

The state has a long history of established Asian communities, including Chinese since the 1850s, Japanese since the 1880s, and Filipinos for over a century. A large wave of Asian immigration since 1965 brought in more Chinese along with Koreans and Southeast Asians after the Vietnam war ended in the late 1970s. South Asians are also a fast-growing group.

California has the largest American population of Southeast Asians, concentrated in the Los Angeles-Long Beach, Sacramento, and Fresno areas. This includes the Hmong and Vietnamese, including Chinese Vietnamese. Long Beach has one of the largest Cambodian American communities in the United States. The neighboring cities of Westminster and Garden Grove have the largest Vietnamese American community outside of Vietnam and are often dubbed "Little Saigon". Vietnamese and Cambodian immigrants also settled in the San Francisco Bay Area, especially San Jose, Santa Clara and Sunnyvale, as well across the San Joaquin Valley and in San Diego.

Over 6,000 Laotian Americans live in the Fresno area, including an even larger Hmong American community, the second-largest of its kind. Other Hmong colonies in the Central Valley of California and Northern California developed since the end of the Vietnam war (1975–79). California also has a Thai American community of over 250,000, concentrated in Southern California, with small Thai and Southeast Asian communities in Perris and Banning in the Inland Empire region. Los Angeles has the largest Thai population outside of Thailand and is also home to the world's first Thai Town. About 150,000 Indonesians live in Southern California, primarily the Los Angeles and San Diego areas.

There is also large population of Assyrian/Chaldean descent living in the Central Valley, with large communities in Modesto, Ceres and Turlock, as well as throughout the Central Coast and the California Desert (i.e. the Coachella and Imperial valleys). San Diego has one of the largest concentrations of Chaldean immigrants in the United States.[26]

California has 2.3 million African Americans as of 2010, the largest population of Black or African Americans in the western U.S,[11] and the 5th largest Black population in the United States. Cities that have the largest share of African Americans and have historically been Black cultural centers include: Compton, Inglewood, Long Beach, Los Angeles, Oakland, Richmond, San Diego and Vallejo.

There are many other cities and towns in the state with sizeable African American populations. These include:

African Americans are approximately 7 percent of the state population. The state percentage of African Americans has dropped in the 1990s and 2000s, though the state's overall number of African-Americans has increased in that time period. The black population in East and West Oakland and South Central Los Angeles - places where they held the majority for decades - has greatly decreased as the black middle class has relocated to nearby suburbs, including those in the Inland Empire and Antelope Valley in Southern California and the Sacramento metropolitan area in Northern California. Many African Americans have also moved to the South, where their grandparents may have come from in the "Great Migration" of the mid-20th century.

As of 2010, California's Native American population of 362,801 was the most of any state.[29] It also has the most Native American tribes, indigenous to the state or not, but the majority of known Californian Indian tribes became extinct in the late 19th century. The U.S. Census includes Latin American Indian, especially immigrants who belonged to indigenous peoples or who have Amerindian heritage from North and South America.

The Cherokee Nation is the largest tribe in the state with a population of 110,000, although the number of Cherokee descendants may surpass 600,000 according to demographers. They are often descendants of Dust Bowl refugees in the 1930s and 1940s who migrated to the state's farming counties and urban areas for jobs. The largest urban American Indian communities are Los Angeles/Long Beach, San Francisco/Oakland, Sacramento, and San Diego areas.[citation needed]

In 2009, illegal/unauthorized/undocumented immigrants constituted an estimated 7% of the population, with the same concentration as Arizona.[32] By 2014, 27% of the residents of California are immigrants; and of those 26% are illegal/unauthorized/undocumented immigrants who comprise almost 10% of the state's workforce.[33]

Comparatively, according to the 2007 American Community Survey, 42.6 percent of California's population older than five spoke a language other than English at home, with 73 percent of those also speaking English well or very well, while 9.8 did not speak English at all.[35]

California had the highest concentration of Vietnamese or Chinese speakers in the United States, second highest concentration of Korean or Spanish speakers in the United States, and third highest concentration of Tagalog speakers in the United States.[35] California was historically one of the most linguistically diverse areas in the world, and is home to more than 70 indigenous languages derived from 64 root languages in 6 language families.[36][37] A survey conducted between 2007 and 2009 identified 23 different indigenous languages of Mexico that are spoken among California farmworkers.[38]

Over 200 languages are known to be spoken and read in California, with Spanish used as the state's "alternative" language. California has more than 100 indigenous languages, making California one of the most linguistically diverse areas in the world. All of California's indigenous languages are endangered, although there are now efforts toward language revitalization.[note 1]

As a result of the state's increasing diversity and migration from other areas across the country and around the globe, linguists began noticing a noteworthy set of emerging characteristics of spoken English in California since the late 20th Century. This dialect, known as California English, has a vowel shift and several other phonological processes that are different from the dialects used in other regions of the country.[42]

Most Roman Catholics in California are of Mexican, other Hispanic, Irish, Italian and Filipino ancestry. The population of Catholic Californians is rapidly growing due to the influx of Latin American and Filipino immigrants. In the state, Roman Catholicism is highly represented among non-Hispanic European-Americans, but less represented among non-Hispanic African-Americans. Protestantism is the majority Christian denomination in non-Hispanic black and white groups.

The largest Christian denominations in California in 2000 were the Roman Catholic Church with 10,079,310; the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints with 529,575; and the Southern Baptist Convention with 471,119. Jewish congregations had 994,000 adherents, or 3% of the Californian population.[45]

California also has the largest Muslim community in the United States, an estimated one percent of the population, mostly residing in Southern California. Approximately 100,000 Muslims reside in San Diego.[citation needed]

A Pew Research Center survey revealed, however, that California is less religious than the rest of the United States: 62% of Californians say they are "absolutely certain" of the belief "in God or a universal spirit", while in the nation 71% say so. The survey also revealed that 48% of Californians say religion is "very important", while the figure for the U.S. in general is 56%.[52]

California has eight of the 50 most populous cities in the U.S., the most of any state. It also has 3 of the 10 most populous cities, tied with Texas for the most of any state. Los Angeles, with close to 4 million people, is the largest city in California and the second largest city in the U.S. Other large cities in California are San Diego (8th), San Jose (10th), San Francisco (12th), Sacramento (34th), Fresno (37th), Long Beach (38th), and Oakland (44th).

About 26% of California's public school students in the 2011–12 school year identified themselves as white (non-Hispanic), and 52% of the state's students identified themselves as Hispanic or Latino. The following ethnic groups that made up the statewide public school student body were Asians (11%), African Americans (7%), Native Americans (0.7%), and Pacific Islanders (0.6%). Students of mixed race made up 2% of the public schools. Hispanics made up the majority of the state's public schools since 2010. Los Angeles Unified School District, the largest school district in California and second largest in the nation, is 73% Hispanic, 10% African American, 9% non-Hispanic Caucasian, 6% Asian, 0.5% Native American, and 0.4% Pacific Islander.[53]

^Mishory, Jennifer. "Azerbaijan deserves U.S. public attention." (Archive) The Daily Bruin. October 22, 2006. Retrieved on September 5, 2013. "Javid Huseynov, a doctorate student at UC Irvine, said the purpose of the event was to strengthen ties between Azeri communities from a variety of countries now residing in the United States. There are 400,000 Azeris in the United States, with over 100,000 of those living in California, he said."

^Wesson, Herb (July 17, 2001). "AB 800 Assembly Bill – Bill Analysis". California State Assembly. p. 3. Retrieved December 27, 2009. In 1986, California voters amended the state constitution to provide that the: The [sic] Legislature and officials of the State of California shall take all steps necessary to insure that the role of English as the common language of the State of California is preserved and enhanced. The Legislature shall make no law which diminishes or ignores the role of English as the common language of California."

^Hull, Dana (May 20, 2006). "English already is "official" in California". San Jose Mercury News (San Jose, California: MediaNews Group). English has been the "official" language of California since 1986, when voters passed Proposition 63. You'd barely know it. The Santa Clara County Registrar of Voters prints ballots in English, Spanish, Vietnamese, Chinese and Tagalog. California drivers can take the written license exam in 31 languages, from Amharic, which is spoken in Ethiopia, to Thai. You can view the state's online Megan's Law database of registered sex offenders in Portuguese or Punjabi. [..] Proposition 63, which received 73 percent of the vote in 1986, was largely symbolic, sending a message to immigrants that they should learn to speak English if they expected to live in California. The measure directed the state to "preserve, protect and strengthen the English language," but did not call for any specific action or enforcement. Twenty-six other states have official-English laws on the books.

^BECERRA, HECTOR (July 4, 2014). "Repair work set to begin at neglected Jewish cemetery". Los Angeles Times. Rabbi Moshe Greenwald, co-director of Chabad of Downtown Los Angeles -- which has led the effort to restore Mount Zion -- said he hopes $700,000 can be raised to properly repair the cemetery, though there would be other ongoing costs after that. Greenwald said several people came forward to help, including businesspeople and real estate developers who gave donations. He said he even got a call from the L.A. Archdiocese, and that he hopes to speak to local church leaders to get the word out about the problem of vandalism.

^Posner, Menachem. "300 Rabbinical Students Heading Out for Summer Sojourns". Lubavitch World Headquarters. Chabad.org is a division of the Chabad-Lubavitch Media Center. Zarchi was followed by Rabbi Efraim Mintz, who served as a Roving Rabbi in California in 1990. Mintz, who directs the Rohr Jewish Learning Institute, shared tips and advice on honing a Torah “elevator pitch,” as well as ideas about presenting more advanced Torah thoughts on a variety of subjects to share with others during the course of their travels.Fishkoff, Sue (March 3, 2006). "That's Growth!". SAN RAFAEL, California: JTA. Shturem.net. Leading the class was Chabad Rabbi Yisrael Rice...Rice, chairman of the Rohr Jewish Learning Institute’s editorial board, asks members of the group why they’re there.Fishkoff, Sue (March 2, 2006). "Chabad institute keeps on growing". SAN RAFAEL, California. Jewish Telegraphic Agency. Rice, chairman of the Rohr Jewish Learning Institute’s editorial board, asks members of the group why they’re there. “I’m trying to put some things together,” one man says. “I’m trying to fix a broken link,” the women next to him says. “Where am I going? God willing, I’m going closer,” the next woman says. Billed as a mystical approach to the concepts of time and the Jewish calendar, The Kabbalah of Time is the 14th course in adult Jewish literacy offered by JLI, a seven-year-old project of the Chabad-Lubavitch movement.